Despite what many (including myself) thought when EA announced they would support the Mac platform, the games EA will release are actually not native ports - instead, they will use Transgaming's Cider engine, a Wine-like wrapper for running Windows games on Intel Macs. This news was found in a Transgaming press release. Apart from the fact that this might negatively affect performance, it also means PowerPC Macs will not be able to play these games.

Technology is not the issue. All Blizzard games have had a simultaneous release on the Mac. The same CD that installs the PC version also installs the Mac version. This has been a feature of Blizzard games since the original Diablo. I didn't play the original Warcraft so I don't know if that was present.

The big problem is the market. Ported games will always cost more and be less widely distributed. That's the situation on the Mac, and that was the situation with Loki. The question at the end of the day is whether Linux users are willing to pay a premium for Linux native games? It's a hard sell, seeing as most Free software users are in it for the gratis and not the libré aspect of free.

The question at the end of the day is whether Linux users are willing to pay a premium for Linux native games? It's a hard sell, seeing as most Free software users are in it for the gratis and not the libré aspect of free.

This is a myth. Linux gamers already pay a premium since they usually paid for Windows, buy the Windows games and often additionally spend money for technologies like Cedega or CrossOver to enable them to use their purchase with their actual operating system.